The Project
by Roses on Thursdays
Summary: It all started to save her father. But when Hermione wakes up fourteen months later without any recollection, she faces the very surgery she created. With dark secrets and strange memories, she has to put the pieces together to condemn a man of crime.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I do not own anything you recognize. There are many things I _do _own- but if you recognize it- it's probably not mine. Try J.K. Rowling, Warners Brothers, Scholastic, the other British publishing company that I don't know the name of... Applies to this _entire _story.**

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**The Project. Prologue**

His head was wrapped in gauze, blond eyebrows peeking out over the top of closed lids; the only reminiscent of the white-blond mane that used to wrap around the scalp of his head. The pale pallor of his skin was pasty, livid circles underneath his eyes, lips a lavender discolorment.

The wire that hung in mid-air jerked with every heartbeat, buzzing gently with each beat. His torso rose ever so slightly, his body resisting movement, but the simplicity of a heartbeat propelling lungs and diaphragm, keeping him alive. Ever so slightly.

The guard outside thought of the buzzing as a quiet sound, like the project of a bumble bee collecting pollen for its hive. He would lean in to look through the tiny, barred window of the solid steel door just to see if he was responsive in any sense. It was his job.

He smoothed his purple robes that signified medi-guard status. He constantly clutched his wand, preparing for the moment that the prisoner would awake. He constantly wore a scowl or a dreamy grin. He only thought of the hell the Death Eater deserved or the soft buzzes of summertime.

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A researcher prepared for surgery. She had signed the consent forms that she had created herself. She had donned the scrubs for sterilization. Her head was shaven of her brown locks, the smoothness bringing a nauseous sensation to her stomach.

She was sitting on the edge of her bed in the hospital, her eyes looking up at the light overhead. Over her head. The light was harsh and seemed to suck all of the pleasantries out of the room. Every color seemed to bathe in a sickly blue light. Even her glistening brown eyes seemed to be duller than the normal coffee-colored rings.

But then again, she seemed to lose all beauty about her when she became distressed. Or so she thought. So she was told, about her eyes anyway.

She was told that when she was sad, the color drained from her eyes like sand through fingers. She became like mud on a lonely construction site on a depressing holiday.

But of course, she didn't remember this. She just blinked the tears away, stared at the ceiling and prayed to whoever was listening for it to work.

It was her baby project. She had been working on it since she was out of school. That was something she had remembered.

She remembered begging for the money from the Ministry, Gringotts, any wizarding bank that would grant her the honor of being a sponsor. That took her ages. Her researching team couldn't work without money. Time took progress, and as they all say, time is money. And they didn't have that. And surgery wasn't popular in the wizarding world.

But they got it. It wasn't easy, and she was sure that she would have wrinkles prematurely because of it. But she didn't mind the extra hours, the laborious procedures, the painful charms.

Now her baby project was going to be performed on her. She was the first human test subject. She was her own experiment.

They didn't want her to do it. They wanted _him _under the scapand (the first step to her overall project). But the bastard was in a coma, blissfully unaware of the world he lived in. She had made sure that performing the surgery without consent of the patient was illegal in any situation. Seeing as he couldn't exactly give consent, she was the only option.

So, there she was, in a purple and white patient gown, her head glistening in the blue-light of fluorescent bulbs remembering what it took to get here.

It took everything.


	2. Timpanis Roar

**AN: IF YOU HAVE PREVIOUSLY READ THIS STORY: I know I have already uploaded this, but I have recently edited the _entire_ chapter, so it is vital that you reread it. There is way more information, so don't worry about being bored. **

**And to my new readers, here is my new story, one I am extremely excited about. I hope it isn't too confusing. It's a whole different take than _Buzzed _or _MtEL, _to prepare you. But I think it's going to be good. Enjoy.**

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**The Project. Timpanis Roar**

Memorative Attainability and Analystic Reconstruction

MAAR

That's what the board called it. Hermione Granger wanted something more witty, intelligent, something not so scary. They insisted that since surgery was such a Muggle procedure, that the name must have Muggle properties. She insisted on arguing because the point of bringing in surgery to the wizarding world was to make it appealing to wizards.

She shut her mouth though. She had already been given credit to the entire project, her team, too. She knew that in the research world it was a big deal to get credit.

She just wanted it to work. She wanted it to be used.

"The Project" was what they called it in her lab. Her team never used MAAR. Years and years of working together, using the same words and connotations wouldn't erase "The Project."

Hermione Granger didn't know what she wanted to do outside of Hogwarts. Everyone thought she had it figured out. But she wasn't sure about anything. She applied to everything: Auror Academies, Medi-Witch Hospitals, Charm Inventor Laboratories, absolutely everything. She got into everything, too. There just wasn't anything she was wholly interested in.

Then she got an owl in the May of her seventh year from World Wizarding Research Centres. She hadn't heard of it before. The owl was short and concise and asked her to come in for an interview May 14th and so she did. The building she Apparated to was somewhere located in England country land. Good thing, too. There wouldn't have been anywhere to place the monstrous building that resided what might've been several miles in a large city.

They all wore bright white cloaks long enough to graze the ground. They flapped around them like capes off an American Muggle comic. The building was classic 19th century laboratory. With stonewalls, stone floors. But some of the equipment surprised Hermione. She recognized standard Muggle chemistry equipment. She recognized stainless steel tables and doors. There was high-tech equipment, along with some of the most break-through equipment of the Wizarding world. Excitement rose up in her heart.

"Interesting, isn't it?" a voice said behind her. She turned around to meet an Indian man with dark skin, loose curly hair and wearing instead of a white cloak, a vivid blue cloak. He smiled at her.

"Doctor James Patel," he said with a friendly lilt. "Director of the Cognitive Department." He stuck out his hand in greeting. Hermione took it.

"Hermione Granger. Nice to meet you," she said, a bit intimidated. He laughed.

"Yes, I know. Don't look so scared. You'll get used to the massive size eventually. You should see the Centre in Russia. It's three times as big. But then again, they have the room," he said. He had a thick British accent and seemed friendly enough. Hermione laughed lightly.

"Bigger than this? I didn't know mass got bigger," she said breathily. He nodded.

"I thought the same thing when I arrived here. I was a Hogwarts recruit like you, seventeen and feeling on top of the world. Then I got here and was assigned to the Circulatory and Repetitive Reconstruction of Partial Refuse." He paused after a moment. "Waste. Basically I was shoveling garbage into these contraptions these American, hippy scientists were working on. Good for them, but not me. But now, I'm a Director of one of the dozens of departments."

"How many are there?" Hermione asked.

"Nearly a hundred. But they change everyday. There are projects that end up out of their own category. Therefore, departments are born and depleted nearly once a week. WWRC (employees informally short it to worc, original, I know) is constantly moving and creating new things. Most of them are ahead of their time. You used one of worc's most prized inventions. The creator is dying to meet you," he said with a cheeky smile. Hermione paused and thought about it.

"The time turner!" she exclaimed after a moment. Dr. Patel nodded. "But McGonagall said-"

"Oh, well. Dr. Castello, the creator, didn't necessarily get the credit he deserved," he said. Hermione nodded and sighed. She tried to gather everything in her head.

"Would I go to the Department of uhh... Circulatory Refuse?" Hermione said with grimace. Dr. Patel laughed and shook his head.

"No. I would like you on the team with me in the Cognitive Department," he said, and began walking around the dimly lit walkway.

Windows were large and open to expose the scientists at work. Hermione tried to imagine little James Patel, back when he was still a Mister, waking down the same hall with the Director of some other major department explaining what he was to do in WWRC. Hermione imagined the curious look on his face that must have been mirrored on hers.

"In the Cognitive Department, appropriately shorted to Cogdep, we study the human brain. We are a pretty small department, seeing as not many wizards are ready to tackle how the mind works."

"Why? I mean, why is it like that? In a huge research centre that explores time travel and creates spells, why wouldn't you want to study the human mind?" Hermione asked.

"Think about it. So many Muggles have tried to master it. Take Freud for example. His theories were so amazingly depressing and outward for his time. But the ideas were revolutionary and scientific. Muggles have dissected the brain, but still cannot figure out what makes us feel love, anger or hatred. They think it is an imbalance in hormones. But just imagine, if a wizard took magic to the human brain, what the results would be," he said with passion. It wasn't one of those recruit speeches. It was like Hermione had answered a question that triggered something. She grinned.

"It'd be chaotic," she said.

"Exactly. Now, we don't exactly research emotions. But that is the reason why wizard scientists mostly stay away from the Cognitive Department. We are also mildly under funded.

"But at the Cognitive Department, our main assignment as of such is to decipher the difference between the Muggle brain and the Wizard brain. This assignment started under my guidance four years ago. Our findings are great, but can't be published as of yet.

"As a recruit, I would like you working on our minor subject. That is the effect of brain-related magic on the brain. Such as truth potions, memory obliviation, last memory extractions and the such. I would, in fact, love to put you on our main assignment, but as a recruit it is prohibited by the rules. Your resume is extensive and I would love to have you work with us. What do you think?"

Hermione was a bit taken aback. "But what about schooling and training?" Hermione asked.

"Degrees at WWRC come in work. Recruits become fully graduated at anywhere between six months and two years. It depends on progress, intention and will. It all balances in what you want here," Dr. Patel finished.

To Hermione, it sounded like an amazing experience. She knew she belonged out fighting in the war, but it had not yet arrived. She knew it would in the next year and she couldn't do anything about it. That's what drove her crazy. She would make the decision when it came to fight. But now…

"I'll do it. I would love to be on your team, Dr. Patel," she said with a grin.

Hermione went back to school where she completed her last exams and spent her last days in her favorite places on Hogwarts grounds. She got the guys up at three in the morning and took them down to the kitchens where they pigged out on éclairs, cheesecake and spiked pumpkin juice.

They would lie in the pleasant almost-summer heat against the bright green on the grass and laugh at the ridiculous images they would charm the clouds into. They even held a mock Quidditch game on the field with their friends, and yes, a game Hermione participated in herself. Harry and Ron tried to get into as much trouble as possible without being expelled for the last week of school (and yes, the professors would say, we can expel you for the last week and it _will _go out your employment resume). Hermione eventually joined them after realizing that she would be leaving them for WWRC.

Hermione was supposed to go into Auror training with them to prepare for the war but she knew it wasn't what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. She knew she was going to be by Harry and Ron's side when the time came, and they knew that. She belonged in the war, fighting for what she believed in, but she knew that after the war was over, Auror continuation was not what she desired.

In fact, she had made an agreement with the Order. She had told Harry, Ron, and the Order that she would be leaving to go work at WWRC until the time came, and if they needed her word, they could sign an agreement.

They believed her, but most soldiers that were working for the Order were signing themselves over to them. It was a promise that when the war began, they would be there to fight wholeheartedly. There were exceptions of course, like if you suddenly became life-threateningly sick, were impaired to not be able to fight.

Hermione signed over her life to the war in promise that she would fight. It was a promise to the Order, Harry and Ron, and herself. It cleared her guilt of achieving her dreams. She did indeed feel guilty, selfish even, for deciding to work at WWRC, but she believed that it would make her happy and most people understood that.

She was to leave for WWRC a week after school ended. Graduation was teary and heartfelt. But dates were already set for a reunion ten years later, so there were promises of keeping in touch, and if not, seeing each other then.

She spent the first and last week of her free summer with Harry and Ron at the Burrow.

They had gone exploring through the forest behind the Burrow. The woods revealed a massive fairytale land of shattered sunlight, ripe vines and angry creepers that threatened to steal the ankles of anyone careless enough. Deep in the center, they found a blossoming fig tree with rich, heavy figs. Hermione was carrying a light bag in which she stuffed nearly three dozen of the ripe fruit. Further along, Ron had swung himself into the depths of a tree.

Having following suit, they found them selves situated comfortably in the trees.

Hermione straddled a particularly thick branch, her ankles crossed under her and her arms straightened behind her, her palms digging into the bark of where the branch connected with the trunk. Her bag was looped around a knob, tossing the guys a fig whenever they wished for one. Many figs laid on the ground in a sad attempt of tossing a fruit and failing.

Harry was above her to her right, one leg hanging and the other parallel to the branch, stretched out before him. Ron was in the tree across from him, sitting in a similar fashion.

"Hey, I've got a question," Ron mused suddenly after a long pause of contemplative silence.

"Mmm 'k," Hermione hummed.

"Do you think any of us will get married?" he asked, looking up from the fig he was currently gnawing on. Hermione laughed, surprised. Harry chuckled, too.

"To each other?" she asked to add a bit of lightness. Ron shook his head sheepishly.

"No, just in general. You know with...everything," he said quietly.

"I don't think I'd want to get married," Harry said thoughtfully. "It just seems like an awful way of putting someone's life in danger."

Hermione frowned at this. "I don't think the war should keep anyone from doing what they want to do," she said disapprovingly.

"Why not?" Ron asked.

"Because it isn't even here yet. I understand why we are preparing for it, but I can't comprehend why everyone is putting their lives on hold for an agonizing terror that isn't even here. I don't see why any of us wouldn't get married," she said forcefully. What they all meant was _would they be alive to ever be married._

"That's our Hermione, the philosophical and reasonable one," Ron said cheekily.

Hermione reached into her bag and chucked a fig at him. of course, the fig missed and smack into the trunk, falling to the rest of the mis-thrown fruit.

"Nice aim, 'Mione. Gonna fig the Death Eaters to death with _that _precision?" Harry teased, laughing. Had he not snatched it out of midair at the last minute, a flying fig would've nailed him right in the temple.

Their days went along like that. They spent endless hours talking. It was hard to keep angst out of their conversations, but dejection had seeped into everyone's lives like a syrupy dye. A stain on everyone's mind that wouldn't come out. But with the heat of the summer and the sun that seemed to shine endlessly, even in the England countryside, angst was easily avoided in most conversations. Hermione tried to make the best out of her weeklong summer vacation.

They had taken an oversized sheet out into the backyard of the Burrow to eat a gigantic lunch of Mrs. Weasley's leftovers when Hermione had the sudden urge to catapult mashed potatoes at Harry's face. And so she did, a large lump of warm mush lading right over his left eyebrow. Thus, ensued a war of their own, which evolved into a high-adrenaline chase into the woods. Hermione was armed with an enormous bowl of banana pudding, vanilla wafers and all; Harry had a pot of chicken potpie; and Ron- well, he had spaghetti. He was to be feared.

They flew past trees and bushes, all subconsciously dashing for the lake that was hidden, abandoned and secluded. Their hysterical laughter rang through the woods, glittering like the splotches of sunlight that littered the forest floor.

Hermione had apple pie in her hair, spaghetti wrapped around her ankle, pumpkin juice down the front of her, and a variety of unrecognizable gunk that fell into the miscellaneous category all over her. She was then nailed in the side by chicken, peas and gravy. She halted and looked for her assailant. He streaked past her in an array of laughter. She scooped a handful of banana pudding in her head and it splattered against the back of his head.

She then ran as if her life depended on it. Her feet flew under her and she felt amazing and carefree. Her muscles strained under her pushing and her abdomen was still halting from her laughter.

Finally, the long, sagging and narrow dock stretched before her. She tossed her plastic bowl to the side and took off across the caving, but still sturdy dock. Her footsteps were followed by another pair, their feet vociferous against the sun-bleached wood. A third pair was added to the noise that echoed against the wall of trees that surrounded them. Soon, Hermione felt spaghetti raining down on her, sauce sliding into her hair, and noodles splattering against the wood.

With a great laugh and a yelp, she pushed off of the edge of the dock and dove headfirst into the green lake water. She surfaced immediately to see Harry in midair, falling to the surface of the water and Ron following suit with a giant whoop.

Pieces of food were surfacing against the water, food ready for the fish to devour.

They swam, splashed, and laughed for a while, letting the warm water immerse them. They laid out on the dock, letting their clothes dry to their skin, decorated with food stains and lake water smells.

Hermione realized that this would probably be one of the last times she would be allowed to be this incredibly happy. This carefree, ecstatic and childish. With that thought and both guys of either side of her, she reach out for their hands, her eyes lids still closed to the sun, and squeezed.

On the eve of the day before Hermione was leaving for her parents' homes, Ron came to fetch both an awake Hermione and Harry at two in the morning. They ascended to the roof, the top still warm underneath Hermione's bare feet, her heart freaking out at the height.

They sat down against the slanting platform and stared at the stars as if their futures were written out there in the wide-open sky for them. There on the roof, Hermione thought her life looked pretty promising up there in those stars.

When she started to cry, both Harry and Ron wrapped their arms around her. She wept into their shoulders

"Promise me that no matter what happens, we'll be there for each other," she said, muffled by their collarbones. "Promise me that the world may be five seconds from imploding but we'll be there by each other. Just like first year in the bathroom. Ever since then and ever since now."

Both guys took advantage of the minimal light to let their emotions shine on their glistening faces.

"I-" Ron started, but his voice cracked. He cleared his throat. "I promise," he said, his voice still cracking.

Harry nodded and spoke softly, "I swear. To the both of you." Ron nodded in agreement.

"I'm not ready for this," she said softly. Harry and Ron pulled back.

"I don't think any of us are. Waiting is the worst part," Ron added. It was quiet. Fire-flies were erupting in the grass below them and little bats could be heard fluttering around the trees.

"I love you guys," she said with more voice. "Please don't ever forget that."

"We love you, too," they both said in rocky unison. The both exchanged glances that indicated that they were too proud to say anything, but they meant what they never said.

They stayed up there until the sun rose, leaving a humid fog around their skin, lazy bags under their eyes, and Hermione's especially puffy ones. Goodbyes were curt and dismissive. They wouldn't go through that again. She gave them two short kisses to their cheeks and Apparated out of the Burrow with a stomach that felt like it was ready to heave at any minute.

She popped into her parents' small cottage where she was to get ready to move into her new flat about a mile from WWRC. They spent their day chatting over brown cardboard boxes either being carried or levitated.

The flat was bright and white, with large windows and hardwood floors. It was small, but appropriate. It was in a Muggle village, but Wizards were not uncommon. Her heart was pounding rapidly with tomorrow's excitement.

Hermione arrived at WWRC the next day. She was handed a light blue lab cloak to wear as her uniform. She was showed to ropes around the Cognitive Department. Dr. Patel had said that they were a small division. but to Hermione the places was rather large. When she said this, Dr. Patel replied in saying that a lot of the major departments took up acres. She was shocked.

The Cog Dep had a steady array of electrical lights and plenty of electrical objects. By looking around, she could see the thousands of pounds and galleons that were used to supply the lab with Muggle and Wizarding equipment.

There were three small labs that made up the department. One major lab for Dr. Patel's primary project and two others that were shared by the interns and other employers on the minor projects.

She didn't go into the lab right away, though. She'd come into work and be trained as a member of WWRC and specific details of working for Cog Dep. There were certain spells to know, background information that was useful and mandatory for use in the labs. Training was short and she was already working in the lab with the other interns and recruits.

There was an exceedingly old man who wore giant glasses that surrounded nearly the entire half of his face. The little ovals in the bottom proved them to be bifocals. He would push up on the bridge of the glasses or pull them down several times a day. He never talked, just carried a small clipboard with a quill and his ink well.

He was part of the Board of Directors and had many recruit teams. He never experiment, but he covered about ten of the small recruit projects on the floor. He was basically a supervisor, but Hermione couldn't help but think that he was like a Muggle janitor, one of those kinds that know everything, like House Elves and servants.

There were about five other recruits on the team. Hermione was the only new one from the ending school year. The others were between a year and three years older.

She immediately befriended a girl named Becca who was eighteen and had been recruited from being a Ministry secretary six months ago. She was light and bubbly with fierce hazel eyes poking out from jagged raven bangs. Her hair was always pulled into a ponytail and gave her a sense of repetition that comforted Hermione.

She was pulled into work viciously. The recruits were not slackers. They made sure that their goals were finished at the end of the day. They worked furiously everyday, with Saturdays and Sundays as half days, but were still crammed with exhausting but exhilarating worc. She had so much to do, and it excited her. She was busy constantly, reading books on the brain, reading up history. She was in hybrid heaven. Hybrid meaning she mixed both of her worlds Muggle and Magic.

But no matter how busy she had become, she had always made time for Harry and Ron. They hosted dinners every Saturday and Sunday to catch up on their weeks. They did their best to never miss the weekends, for it felt like it was the only keeping them together. They would go in circles as to who treated the dinner. When Harry and Ron hosted, they normally went out to eat. But one Saturday, when it was Hermione's turn to host, she had them come over to her flat.

She was bustling around the kitchen when Ron popped in, unnoticed by Hermione. He scooped her up right as she was frantically diving for a pot of boiling sugar and cinnamon that was quickly bubbling up at rapid speeds. She yelped.

"The sugar! The sugar!" she cried while trying to wiggle out of his grasp. He let go with what might've been a saddened expression. She jerked the sticky substance off of the stove and in an instant, she had tackled Ron in a giant hug.

"Ugh! I've missed you," she exclaimed. "You better have had fun in Australia, or you best not be here." She grinned and a pop echoed her statement. Harry stood in her foyer with what looked like a bottle of alcohol. She smirked at him and enveloped him in another rather large hug.

They exchanged greetings and Hermione finished preparing dinner and set it on her round unpolished oak table.

"Breakfast for dinner?" Harry raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, I thought it was a good idea. Except I kind of scorched the syrup. Hope you don't mind," she said sheepishly. She poured the bottle of Sauvignon Blanc Harry brought over into her nicest wine glasses. She raised her own glass.

"A toast. To new jobs, vacations in Australia, and preparations for what's to come," she said with a grin. She looked down at her plate. "Oh, and good pancakes, rubbery, scrambled eggs and some slightly sweetened bacon."

They glasses clinked together in agreement and began their meal.

"How was Australia, Ron? You've been there for three weeks and we haven't even gotten a story yet," Harry stated after a generous sip from his wine.

"Yeah, Ronald. There were very few letters," Hermione exclaimed.

"I told you 'Mione, it's just work. Nothing exciting. They would've sent Harry too if he wasn't working with the Order on training the rising seventh years throughout this summer."

"So, no stories?" she pouted.

"Not particularly. There was this one odd incident with Vegemite, but fill in the blanks when I said, vomit, humiliation and tar-like substances," he said with a laugh.

"What about you Mione, how's worc?" Harry asked. Hermione grinned.

"It's amazing. I absolutely adore it. Although, I'm always afraid that I'm just going have to get up and leave when the war comes. I feel like I should be training or something." She sighed. Ron and Harry frowned a bit. They've heard this plenty of times. Sure, they wanted her training with them, but she was happy and she had nothing to be worried about.

"You're not doing anything wrong. You'll be well-prepared by the time the war comes. You don't have anything to worry about," Ron said, pushing the last of his pancakes into the homemade syrup.

"What exactly is going on there?" Harry asked.

"Well, it's amazing really. I've only been in the lab for a week, but I'm already finding results in the obliviation charm. That's what we're working on right now. The effects that an obliviation charm has on a person. I've found some really amazing stuff. I still feel like the kid first-year though," she said with a laugh.

"Uh, so what...exactly did you find?" Ron said, a little uncertain.

"It's difficult to explain. We're not sure if what we're finding is a result of decomposition-"

"What?" Harry sputtered.

"Oh, we have to use cadavers for experiments. It's too expensive to pay for volunteers to come in and get tested. So, we use cadavers from local morgues and hospitals. We get a lot of Muggles, so then again, we're not sure if there's a difference," she said.

"You mean people volunteer to be studied?" Ron asked, a bit disgusted.

"Of course. It pays very well even given the risks. People are lazy and daredevils, so they offer the only thing they have: themselves. But we wouldn't be able to pay the volunteers nearly enough money with the budget that the Board of Directors grants us."

"So, I still want to know what you find," Harry said. Hermione was getting giddy with her worc. It had become a passion.

"Well, I can now do obliviation charms perfect wandlessly. I've cast so many obliviation charms that I'm sure that my wand is going to reach its quota for its lifetime," she said with a laugh. "It's against protocol to use wandless magic in the labs. Too many accidents, too much scandal. Your wand must be present at each time," she explained further.

"But what I have found on our cadavers is dilation of the irises. Well, not particularly. I've been working on only sight for the week. I've had to dissect human eyes _several _times before. But when I look at the cells before and after the spell, I find that afterwards those cells in the eyes expand considerably."

"That's not weird or anything," Ron said, swirling the wine in the bottom of the glass. Both Harry and Hermione laughed.

"How about you, Harry? How's _your _life?" Ron asked.

"It's alright. Training kids who I am barely a year older than. It's really odd. I can't bring myself to be superior over them. Some of their arm movements are more mastered than my own." He paused slightly. Then, randomly and remorseful, "There was an attack, I trust you guys know?"

Both Hermione and Ron sighed. Hermione was twirling a fork around, the handle between her fingers, and one corner making a small little ole in her table. Ron was still picking at his pancakes.

"Yeah, I heard," Hermione said, speaking up.

"Who didn't?" Ron concurred. "_Five Death Eaters dead when attacking Muggle home in Chelsea,_" he recited the headlines.

"Guns right?" Hermione stated. Harry nodded.

"We arrived about two minutes too late. The husband kept a shotgun under his bed-"

"That's a little extreme," Hermione said.

"Yeah, he's pleading self-defense. And he'll win, as he should," Harry said nodding.

"There were eight Death Eaters that invaded their home around two in the morning. It was a family of seven." Ron frowned here. "The mother, father, sister of the mum's, her eight-year old daughter and the mother's and father's five year old son, fourteen-year old daughter and nineteen-year old returned for the summer from an American university."

"The Death Eaters Apparated into their home, no signs of forced entry or unlocking spells. They went for the sister first," Harry wore a very grim face. He was obviously bothered by the images flashing through his head. "The police had to leave the room in order to not wreck the evidence with vomit. The only was to describe the sister was maimed. They had used awful Muggle methods. There were signs of sexual abuse." Harry looked like her was going to be sick. They had all pushed their plates away but they wanted to truth, so they didn't stop him. Harry took a deep breath.

"The husband heard the noises and took his gun out from under the bed. He woke his wife, not wanting her to be alone, so he says. They go in search of the noise, when the wife was hit with _Crucio. _The husband said this is when he shot the first Death Eater. His wife's screams made him reflex. The Death Eater was killed instantly, but his wife was still writhing in pain. She would die thirty minutes later of internal bleeding in her abdomen.

"To make the rest of the story less gruesome, the sister, wife, and two girls died. The husband shot five Death Eaters, each one dead instantly. He was in the process of being tortured by the last three Death Eaters when the Order arrived," Harry said sighing. "They didn't want to kill him, they said. The Aurors have a sneaking suspicion that female targets were their way of 'reducing the Muggle population."

"Oh, my God. That's awful.That's...oh, Merlin. _Awful_," Hermione said, trying to blink away her tears. Ron was shocked into speechlessness.

"Do you think this starts the war?" Hermione asked quietly.

"I don't know. Not many magical people were involved. But I can't imagine that it's going to come much later," Harry said. The both of them nodded, frightened.

"You still promise?" Hermione asked. Both Ron and Harry grinned.

"We swear."

­­­­­

Hermione was pulled into worc, always fascinated with her discoveries. The recruits worked together, compared their results to the others and made conclusions. They spent a great deal of time together, and being the youngest on the teams, the recruits did fun, young adult things. Like started food fights in the Cog Dep lounge. They swapped stories and laughed like mad. Hermione couldn't ever imagine herself leaving WWRC. It was what she was supposed to do and she knew it.

There were pleasant grounds that surrounded the massive facility. Becca, Hermione and two other friends of theirs Henry and Jacob would find solace from sterilization and gloves under a giant oak tree and swap stories.

Becca turned out to be a sadist but at the same time, sweet and adoring. Her hazel eyes penetrated you with the truth and at the same time, a lie. She went to Wizarding School in Italy on the coast of Capri. She was born in Manchester in England but moved to an English-speaking town in Belgium before attending school in the Mediterranean.

Her parents were archaeologists who traveled the world in search for knew evidence of the past, evidence that may reveal secrets to the Muggles. Becca was always prattling on about how history was not nearly as inconspicuous and careful as the present day. She spoke her parents' philosophy when she meant that the magicians of the world needed to be more careful when it applied to exposing the world of their own.

Henry was a shy character with dark brown eyes hidden behind rimless, rectangular glasses and cropped sandy-blond hair. He was serious and studious, but science was his passion. He had a kind smile and quick wit that always had Becca and Hermione doubling over in his deadpans. He graduated from Cambridge in May with a degree in neuro-science and was home schooled by his mum while his father taught as a professor in quantum physics.

Jacob was the kid of the team. Hermione, in respect, was the youngest, but Jacob enjoyed goofing off and making dark situations or long resultless days better. He had hilarious impersonations and was bold when it came with his elders. He had quite an attitude, but was still easy to work with. He was always in trouble with Dr. Patel, but he was too intelligent to be let off the team. He was tall and lanky with brown eyes that were surrounded by long brown eyelashes that matched his light brown, curly, and unruly hair. He only graduated a year before Hermione at Hogwarts but they didn't meet until they began working together.

Their own team was a comfort to Hermione when she missed Hogwarts or Harry and Ron. Or anyone really. She missed being with the Weasleys and curling up in the window seats of her dorms. She missed the train rides back to school and their late-night extravagant rendezvous.

They laughed a lot and worked hard. The work was maybe tedious, but the excitement of finding something new enticed them from boredom.

Early August, Hermione had moved from exploring the eyes of cadavers, believing that she couldn't proceed unless she knew more about the other four senses. She was dissecting a tongue with careful precision, collected the taste buds, five to a vile to be frozen and tested when Dr. Patel entered the laboratory.

Everyone turned to him expectantly, but when he made his way towards Hermione without any acknowledgement to them, they retreated back to work.

He had a solid white envelope in his hand. The first thing that registered in her mind was _my parents. _If it weren't, she'd have be expecting a roll of parchment.

She watched him, scalpel still in her hand, as he approached her, then kneeling down by her stainless steel table she was operating on. He looked at her with sympathy. Her heart skipped a beat and she took off her rubber gloves with a snap and removed the goggles from her face. She had a angry, red imprint wrapped around her eyes where the goggles had been for the past few hours.

His lips pursed. _Oh, Merlin. Something is wrong. _He placed the bright white envelope entitled _Hermione _on a clean stack of papers that were not covered in dissecting and preservation fluid.

"I want you to pack up your things and get yourself home before you read this." His young face was etched in a cross between pity and disappointment. "Let us know how many days you'll need to take off so your work can be split among your team."

"I'm sure Dr. Patel, whatever it is, that I'll be able to come back tomorrow," she said, standing up. Her heart was beating rapidly with what ever be wrong. She just knew that the blue ink scratched across the otherwise blank envelope was her mother's handwriting.

"Miss Granger, please just do as I say. I don't think that reading this letter next to a half-gutted cadaver would be very appropriate. I would also like to know that my laboratory is not disturbed by personal complications," he said sternly.

"And by me leaving wouldn't be a disruption?" Hermione started.

"Miss Granger, this is a Cognitive Research Centre. We study everyday the effect emotions have on work. We are very aware of what disruption would occur. Now, if you would, please do as I say. I do not expect you back in work tomorrow," he said briskly, although his still black eyes still screamed pity. Hermione sighed and gathered her belongings, eyeing the letter as she sterilized the table. Removing her cloak and pristinely-white Keds, she tucked them away in the closet.

She went to the Apparition port and popped into her foyer of her darkening-room. She quickly opened the flap, discarding it on the floor, the familiar blue and red-striped lined paper staring at her. She unfolded the neatly creased pages as the scent of her mother floated out to meet her along with the short prose.

_Dear Hermione,_

_Your father is in the hospital but we do not know what to do or say. I do not anyway. He does not remember anything. I fear of saying too much. _

_Your Mother. _

Hermione inhaled sharply, her vision becoming unfocused. With a few panicked breaths, she seized the knob of her door trying to push away the horrible visions she was receiving. She dumped her things to the floor, excluding her purse and Apparated as quickly as she could to her parents suburban.

Her pop echoed the room, but there was obviously no one there but her to hear the echo. Even then, she called out for her parents, who were nowhere to be found.

The normally tidy house was a bit in disarray, pushing Hermione into a even deeper panic. Figurines lined the floor, broken and cracked. There were pillows strewn across the floor. Her eyes went in search for her parents' bedroom, but when she noticed the upturned, stool that accompanied her mother's vanity from the hallway, she turned and ran looking for any sign of her parents anywhere.

Then she noticed that the coffee table that normally was ornamented with coffee cups and old newspapers only supported a single sheet of paper, folded just as neatly as her former note, name written in the exact same script, her mother's. In a measurement that kept her from being sick with worry, she snatched up the paper reading the short line.

_The Memorial Hospital, Room 504. _

Hermione immediately left the house, snatching the keys off of the hook. She didn't bother in getting her license, but her parents taught her when they found out that driving wasn't a normality in the Wizarding world. The drive was a bit nerve-racking for it had been a year since she had to last drive the navy blue SUV that belonged to her father, the black luxury car that belong to her mother, missing.

Although her fingers were wrapped around the steering wheel, not going over 45 mph, she was relieved with the distraction. She found it easier to focus on the glistening gravel before her instead of what could possibly be one of the worst discoveries and occurrences in her life.

She argued with the receptionist at the front of ER until she was forced to let her in without ID or anything. Hermione foregoed the elevator and climbed the steps to the fifth floor, skipping three at a time.

She whipped past 532, 515, 509, and finally 504. She took a deep breath and looked inside the large window to see her mother holding on to her father's hand. She looked towards her father and saw him unscathed. Her worst fear erupted in her stomach like sodium and water. Heart attack.

Her mum looked up from her husband to see Hermione peering into the window. She crossed the room just as Hermione moved to open the door. She had barely closed the oak door behind her when she was embraced fiercely by her soft, plump mother. Hermione felt her mother trembling in her arms, but when she let go of Hermione, she realized that it she who was shaking, not her mother. She was trembling with fear and ignorance.

She looked down into her mother's pristine blue eyes. Hermione over-shot her mum by at least three inches. Her face was blotchy and red. She seemed years older than when Hermione had last seen her. Tears were pooled at the crevices of her eyes and she began to babble.

"He doesn't know who I am," she kept repeating over and over again. Her eyes darted back and forth across Hermione's face in anxiety. Hermione held her mother at arms length and looked at her father. No blood, no bandages. Just the steady beat of his electrical heart monitor, the green line bouncing steadily across the screen. It had to be a heart attack. She looked back to her mother.

"Mum, what happened?" she said in a low whisper. _Oh, God please don't tell me he's dying, Mum. Please, lie to me anything, _she pleaded with her eyes. Her mother chocked on a sob, and Hermione pulled her to her again, put she pulled away.

"It was...was...them," she stumbled.

"Who? Who's them?" Hermione questioned further.

"I don't know. But you talked about them, the god awful creatures in dark robes. And horrid masks. I thought I was dreaming, but their cackling woke me. It was such an awful sound," she stumbled.

Hermione let go of her mother as the world spun around her. She fell lethargically into the wall, dizziness taking over her as she clutched against the painted concrete. Her back pressed into the cold stone as her knees bent beneath her to support her better. Her mum gently led her to a coral-colored visiting chair where Hermione could catch her breath. She looked at her mum wildly.

"Death Eaters?" she croaked. Her mother nodded vigorously.

"Yes, them. They attacked. We were sleeping when they got there. Their laughing echoing around my dreams until it became too loud. They were in the doorway of our bedroom just sitting there. I screamed as your father reached for the gun in the drawer behind the bed. You remember it, honey? The end table, not the gun. The one you finger-painted on 'accident?'" her mother said reminiscing. Hermione stared at her mum, who was kneeling in front of her on her knees.

"Mother, yes, I remember it. But what happened?" Hermione pushed. The lightness in her eyes of Hermione's five-year old antics being replaced with not tears this time, but fear.

"When, there was light, a lot of light. Then Patrick started to scream and he dropped the gun. I've never heard your father in all of my life, sound like that. The sounds were loud an in unison. Their laughter was madness. But the light disappeared and Patrick stopped screaming. As I reached for him, he was still shaking, I felt- it was horrible. I can't get rid of the feeling. It's like a ghost," she said, placing a hand to her abdomen.

"Oh, God, Mum, are you alright? Does it hurt anywhere? Why aren't you in bed?" Hermione said in a panic. Her mother's aimless rambling was making her uneasy.

"Oh, it was so short. Your father stopped it. Then they seemed to panic. They cast one more spell at your father. They cackled. The sound won't go away. It was the most even sound. Except the way they said that horrid spell. They cackled then left. Just left," she finished. It wasn't until he stared at me with the most vacant expression that I took him to the car. And now, they're telling me that he's suffering amnesia. I can't tell them what happened, because you warned me against it. And they don't know what's wrong."

"He doesn't remember _anything?" _Hermione gasped out in horror, her body shaking violently. Her mother noticed and embraced Hermione into a large hug.

"Nothing after twenty-five years ago," she said weakly. Hermione felt her lungs contracting, her heart breaking and her mind detaching itself from her. She mimicked her brain and removed herself from her mum's embrace to slowly approach her sleeping father's bedside. She brushed away a long strand of sandy-blond hair with sprinklings of white around the edges from his forehead. She knelt down beside him on her knees and took his big hand in hers.

She outlined the calluses in his hand. The spirals of white, dead skin reminded her of gardening with him. They'd plant a new tree every spring break, the circle they had started when she was five.

The past month of March had completed the ring of vegetation, with each trees smaller than the other. It wound around like a spiral staircase. Her father would tell her that it was a pathway to Heaven, the skies, the clouds, moons and stars. Most importantly the moons and stars.

She blinked away the puddles that rimmed her eyes. Would those memories be lost to him? The thought made her audibly gasp in emotional pain, one cool tear fell from her cheek and onto a light-brown mole.

"Oh, Daddy, please, please wake up," she muttered pitifully. The noise answered her with his eyes fluttering open to reveal her own mirrored brown eyes.

He looked around the room, the color and ceiling assumingly familiar to him, but when he looked down at the pressure of her hand in his, and the tickling of the moisture still sitting precariously on his knuckle. She thought that she saw something flicker in the globes and her heart fluttered with hope.

Hermione waited for him to say her name. _Please, Daddy, say my name. Please, oh, please. _

He searched her face but every faded freckle, eyelash and crease in her lips brought more confusion in his sleepy eyes. He smiled uncertainly.

"Well, who are you?" he asked kindly, weariness lacing his melodic lilt.

Hermione's posture slackened, and her face stretched in preparation of crying. She felt something inside her break painfully, as if a part of her heart was knocked off by a blunt object. For some reason, she imagined a large mallet used to beat tympanis with the soft fuzz-like material wrapped around the top. _Wham, _right in to her heart, the sound resonating around her chest cavity.

"Daddy," she whispered. She stared him straight in the eye. "It's me, Dad. Hermione. Your daughter?" her voiced cracked on the last word, the knot in her throat threatening to suffocate her with held back tears.

_Be strong. _She squeezed his hand and with both hands, brought his long-fingered hand to her heart, as if the rhythmic beat would remind him of the parental duty of telling their child what a heartbeat is. Her head on his chest with her right ear over the top of his right lung. Giggling and laughing from the sound, Hermione insisted that he listened for her. She wanted to have this amazing sound that her father did.

She heard her mum from behind her, standing in front of the chair Hermione had crumpled into, her arms wrapped around her like she was cold.

"Patrick, dear-"

A frown crossed her father's features in unmasked confusion and distress. He pulled his hand away from Hermione's, uncomfortable about the loving gesture. "I'm sorry. You must be mistaken. I don't have a daughter."

The timpani roared with the clamor of the mallet striking her fiercely. The pain rippled from the crown of her head, the cuticles of her fingers and the calluses on the bottoms of her feet. She began to tremble and when she couldn't take the pressure anymore, she picked her hands up from her lap and covered her face. She slid down to her heels and leaned into the side of the mattress, her hands clutching at the starched, white, cotton sheet that hung neatly off of the side of the hospital bed. She sobbed helplessly, lost memories swirling freely among her own mind.

The smell of latex and corn starch on his hands after work, the way she would trace the white powder from in-between his cuticles. She remembered the trees, each with a name of their own, springing from his imagination. She remembered the way they would banter during the summertime meals. Everything she remembered, that he had no recollection of.

Then the terror of what they must have felt during that night. Guilt sobered her up quickly. She should have been there. It was her duty as a witch to protect them. She pushed herself up with fury.

"Mum, we're taking him to St. Mungo's. Go discharge him," she said briskly. She then went to the bathrooms, for she knew her father wouldn't be susceptible to her disappearing out of the room.

"What do you mean there's nothing you can do? There has to be _something! _My God! This is the Wizarding Society! You can't just say with such ease that you can't do anything to restore his memory!" Hermione screamed at the Medi-Wizard. His hands were tucked in his cloak pockets with a stern disposition.

"I'm sorry, Miss Granger. But your father has suffered an extremely powerful obliviation charm. You of all people should know that there is no undoing an obliviation charm. Or should I direct you to Mr. Lockhart's room?" he said sternly.

"But that was _years _ago! You are the best doctors in the country! You just can't tell me this _rubbish!" _she screamed. But she knew he could. She was just angry, and unreasonable. She studied obliviation charms. She knew there wasn't any possible way to restore his memory.

Due to Hermione's incessant pleads to get checked by a Medi-Witch, which turned out to be a good idea. Both her father and mother were attacked with_ Crucio_ and her mother had some minor bruising on her abdomen. Seeing her mum staring helplessly into a goblet of pumpkin juice against the white sheets, her chestnut-brown hair smiling past her shoulder-blades into creases of her stomach chased her anger away.

"Dear, you shouldn't get so angry at the man. It's not his fault that your father was hurt," she said. Hermione sighed exasperated, sitting down on the edge of the cot.

"No, I take the blame for that one," she said bitterly. Her mum gave her a harsh look that proved her that her mother did not feel the same way. "I know, it's not his fault, but I don't want to believe there's nothing we can do. Muggles, they knock their head, lose their memory, and it eventually comes back. But with an obliviation, they just tell me there's nothing they can do. How am I supposed to take that?" Hermione asked rhetorically.

Helen Granger stared at her with big, sad eyes. "I really don't know." There was a sad silence that clung to them. It was sad, but comfortable. Hermione had many questions, but didn't really know how to ask them.

"How long did you say the time frame was?" she asked.

"Time frame?" she repeated. "Oh, you mean the memory loss?" Hermione nodded. "Twenty-five years. Almost exactly. The police asked their own questions, then had me ask my own. I started with the most recent, then went backwards. No Hogwarts graduation, no passing of his mother, then his father."

"What about you? Does he remember...uh.." Hermione asked, uncertain whether or not it was a good idea. She shared a smile with Hermione.

"He remembers Helen, the young girl he met as a boy, courted through college years. But he doesn't remember the wedding, the proposal, the new two-bedroom home we decorated ourselves with you in my belly. Not even the practice we opened together," she recollected. Her eyes were dry but Hermione couldn't tell if she was trying to be strong, or all cried out.

For the first time Hermione saw how much this was hurting her mother. This was the man she was in love with. Her college-years sweetheart. And he didn't remember their life together, the child they had together, the ancient memories that weren't supposed to fade for ages from now. Hermione wrapped her arms around her mum and they clutched to each other, sharing enough memories to reincarnate Patrick Granger for them in the room.

With her face buried into her mother's bare shoulder, the smock slipping off of her shoulder, the soft skin touching her cheek like a silent promise.

Then, Hermione vowed to do everything in her power to fix this.


	3. The Project

AN- Alright, here's Chapter Two, the much shorter and less emotional (in my opinion) part of the original Chapter One. This chapter may get a little confusing, so _please _let me know what you think so I can help it move along in further chapters. And to let you know- Chapter Three is already written and ready to be posted, so the more reviews, the sooner the post (yes, I am a groveling idiot).

* * *

**The Project. The Project**

Hermione returned to her flat that evening, emotionally exhausted and worrisome. She couldn't get the image of her father's complete confusion out of her head.

She returned the SUV to her parents' home from which she Apparated into her quiet, dark flat. She dumped her purse and kicked off her shoes in the foyer where she proceeded to drag her way into the kitchen where she produced two bottles. One with _Fire Whiskey _printed across the neck in shimmering gold and red letters. Somehow, the second bottle in her hand was more appealing. The dark blue label read _Watson's 2 Reduced Fat Milk. _

She grabbed herself a tall frosted glass from her freezer, smiling at her cynical humor. She poured the milk into the mug that was frozen to contain beer, whiskey, Bailey's anything, really. Anything but milk.

She hadn't even bothered in turning on any lights and since it was going on eleven. There wasn't any light to be seen, except the sprinkling of silver moonlight slipping in-between the spaces of her ventilation blinds. Hermione stared into the vast openness of her beverage.

_Her legs were curled up under her, the seat's cushion plush at her ankles. She watched as the milk swirled into the tall mug, the sound of crackling echoing out through the kitchen. She reached out to trace a pattern on the frosted surface with her fingernail. _

_She smiled up at her daddy, who was wearing an old Proclamations t-shirt that he would never be caught dead in when in public. The black was fading and the hems were frayed and coming undone. His hair was still neat from a day at work and his glasses brimmed his nose, contacts in a case in the bathroom. _

_Hermione was only eight-years old, her hair as wild as ever from a night of tossing and turning. She was dressed in a knee length pink nightgown with frilly sleeves and hems. She had been having premature insomnia lately, her imagination running too wild to be disturbed from a minute thing like sleep. She had found her father on the balcony in the summer nighttime, reading by the porch light that hung above the sliding glass door. _

_He then escorted her to the kitchen, where his was now pouring a glass, or mug rather, of milk for the each of them. Her mum and she had made cookies that afternoon, so there were still-soft chocolate chip cookies ready to be eaten in the middle of the table. _

_When he finished, he sat down across from Hermione, pushing her giant glass towards her. Hermione had difficulty grasping it and picking it up. She also had it in her mind that these mugs were an adult thing and that she wasn't supposed to touch them. She had negative connotations enforced by her parents about alcohol, so when she was handed the frosted glass in front of her, she was hesitant._

_"I prefer milk in the mugs," her father mused. "It just tastes better."_

_Hermione tested his theory, but in the process, spilt milk down the front of her satin nightie. Her father laughed nonchalantly and grabbed her a straw in which she sucked the nearly brain-freeze-worthy, cold milk, watching as the milk slowly crept down to the bottom of her mug._

_"Daddy?" she asked quietly, while she palmed a misshapen lump of a cookie. _

_"Yes, 'Mone?"_

_"Have you ever thought that your life is just one big dream?" she asked, staring at the cookie._

_"Like you're too happy for it to be real?" he asked, impressed and taken aback by her question. Hermione shrugged._

_"I guess. I mean, maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and be three again, and not remember anything."_

_"Well, that's impossible dear," he said with a smile._

_"Why?" Hermione asked, feeling a little dumb._

_"Because the greatest of all memories can't disappear. That's why there's fairy tales. Because Cinderella really was a girl, and whether or not she had a magical fairy godmother or a pumpkin carriage, she had her own life. It just so happens that no one forgot hers." _

_"So, if we both woke up tomorrow, and you're not my daddy and I'm not your 'Monie, someone would remember our lives now?" Hermione asked confused. _

_"Yes, I guess so. But I believe it'd would be impossible to erase some memories. And there is no way I could ever forget my little 'Monie," he said, and they both smiled at each other._

Hermione sighed and watched the milk in her mug flutter in little tiny ripples. Then, she sat erect, her entire body alert with the presence of a revelation.

Hermione got up really early that morning. But really, in all truth, she never really "got down." She had stayed up all night reading, her heart skipping with new ideas, possibilities, imaginations. In fear of losing even the slightest fragment, she wrote down everything she thought about on a piece of parchment.

Her laptop was set atop her lap, her fingers flying across the web browsers, her head in as many neurosurgery books that she had on her. She didn't actually know how many books she had when she actually started looking.

After throwing on some clean jeans and a navy-blue, short-sleeved blazer, she left her flat with her pages of research and findings. WWRC didn't even start to really operate until nine, but she knew the advisors got there much earlier. She arrived at worc at about six, where she stood idly, her sling backs tapping the excited rhythm in her head.

Her weariness soon grabbed a hold of her, so she made herself comfortable on the marble floors and against the heavy wooden door to Dr. Patel's office. He didn't arrive until about five before seven, already jotting something down on his clipboard. When she saw him approaching, she stood up hastily, lugging the bag with all of her newly found ideas up with her.

He noticed the movement and looked up. He walked up to the sheepish-looking Hermione, she was adjusting her bag. He gave her a clean, curious and stern look. She opened her mouth to say what she had prepared all morning, including the extremely early hours. But he cut her off.

"Miss Granger, I thought I told you that you were not to come in today," he said briskly.

Hermione nodded but spoke in return, "Dr. Patel, after what happened yesterday with my father, I came here to ask you a question," she said calmly.

"Pray tell, Miss Granger, what is that question?" he asked.

"How intensely has the obliviation curse been studied?" she said, although it looked like she already had the answer.

"Not much. We just know that it is irremovable," he said. Hermione pursed her lips.

"So, are you telling me that no study has been made to further this theory?" Hermione said.

"There is no theory, Miss Granger. The statement is fact. There is no way to undo the damage caused by an obliviation charm," he said sternly.

"There are no facts in science, Dr. Patel, you know this. There are theories and laws, both which state that they can be altered. And not only is this science, Dr. Patel, but this is magic! There are no such things as _fact_," she said passionately. Dr. Patel sighed.

"What are you saying, Miss Granger?"

"I am saying that I have stayed up studying the way the obliviation charm works. There is nothing to research! Then I came up with a theory of my own. However the charm works, I believe that surgery can be a way to remove it!" she exclaimed.

"Surgery? You can't be serious. Surgery has not yet been susceptible in the wizarding world," he said, finally unlocking his office and going in. Hermione followed him into the dark. He flipped on the lights, sickly blue fluorescent. Electricity was a necessity at WWRC.

"But it _can _be."

"But obliviation charms need live volunteers. Unless you want to find a way to bring your cadavers back to life along the way and ask them exactly what they remember," he stated sarcastically.

"Well, we can find the money. Sponsors. We'll run the idea past the board, we'll hunt sponsors," Hermione said.

"Miss Granger, like I said, do you just want to shove a scalpel in a wizard's face and expect them to agree to surgery?"

"Dr. Patel, there has to be a way. Just think about it. That the memory is only shielded, not completely and unalterably changed. Think of the way the charm can be removed, unmasking that evidence," Hermione said.

"What kind of evidence?" he said at the oddness of her word.

"The war, Dr. Patel! Think about amount of obliviation charms that will be cast in the next years. Think about how many fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, sons and _daughters _will be affected by their memory dissolving into thin air. Think about how many memories can be achieved and taken in as evidence. The light side will be able to take victims and use surgery to their advantage!" Hermione said, pacing around the room.

"Granger, if this is about your father-"

"Dr. Patel, this is only partially about my father. But you can not deny the fact of what potential this idea has!" she said.

"If it _works!" _he exclaimed. Hermione stared him directly in the eye.

"Dr. Patel, you cannot seriously be doubting the probability of the success of this. This is a _research _institution! This is our purpose, your purpose; this is the entire fucking _building's _purpose!" Hermione stopped in horror of her slack language. She was a firm believer that cursing was not a way to be professional. She took a deep breath and began to start again. "How are we to know if we don't try?" she asked timidly.

Dr. Patel seemed to roll the idea around in his head for a while. He also seemed taken aback by her fierceness and aggressiveness. He sat down at his desk and began to think a bit.

"Alright, Miss Granger, you seemed determined enough. If I allow this I must be first supervisor, all progress is returned to me and if one thing goes wrong, I'm shutting it down," he stated.

Hermione had to stifle her squeal. She wanted to run over to him and hug him, scream thank you over and over again, but instead she thanked him (quietly) and left to start her progress.

* * *

Hermione was to spend the evening not with just Harry and Ron, but with the entire Weasley clan. She wasn't very prepared for answering questions about the current state of her father, but if it was for anyone to know, it was that family.

She pulled on a yellow sundress, for it was still mid August. She was fixing herself in the mirror when the idea struck her. Harry and Ron were leaving for Auror training in Romania next week. For two months.

She sighed sadly, while she twisted her hair into a neat bun at the nape of her neck. Grabbing her purse, she quickly Apparated to the family that actually remembered her. She winced physically at the harshness at the thought, but dismissed it sullenly as she was attacked by the massive redheads.

They were sitting on the patio that over-looked the great green plains of the woods that surrounded the Burrow. The air was warm and sticky, and the sun had begun to set behind the massive green foliage. Hermione was sucking on a lemon from her lemonade and waited for the questions to approach her.

Sitting around the large glass table was Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Charlie, Bill, Ginny, Ron and Harry. They were watching as Charlie and Bill's wives chased their children around the yard, their laughter ringing loudly and jocundly.

"How are your parents, Hermione, dear?" Mrs. Weasley asked Hermione.

"_Mum," _Ginny and Ron hissed at the same time. Mrs. Weasley cast them an innocent look.

"I was just inquiring their health, that is all," she said quietly. Hermione looked up from her glass and smiled sadly.

"It's fine. I wish I could say they were doing terrific, Mrs. Weasley, but I'm afraid that I won't be able to say that truthfully for some time. I appreciate your concern, though," Hermione said, surprised by her own formality towards them.

"Do you know what happened?" Ginny asked, suddenly curious.

Hermione guessed now that once one person had the nerve to ask, the others were allowed to inquire the same subject.

"They were attacked by Death Eaters," she said, back to inspecting her lemon thinking about the Fibonacci sequence, anything about that night. The intuitive Molly caught on, by the rest of the table did not notice her reluctance.

"Oh, Jesus," Harry breathed. "I didn't know that. The Aurors weren't contacted," he said, a bit irritated.

"I know. I didn't want them in on this," Hermione said.

"And why is that?" Ron asked.

"Because, it's to personal. I had it filed as an incident, but I refused an investigation," she said, now plucking the seeds from the lemon's insides.

"You don't want justice?" Mr. Weasley asked.

"Not at this particular moment. My family needs to focus on getting the practice running again, my father getting his memory back an-"

"His memory back? What do you mean by that?" Mr. Weasley prodded. Hermione finally looked up.

"I'm researching a way to reverse the effects of an obliviation charm," she said with some excitement.

"Hermione, there is no way to reverse an obliviation charm," Mr. Weasley said with evident pity and apprehension in his voice. Hermione sat up, placing her glass on the table.

"There is no evidence that anything says such a thing. The idea has been stationed in our heads that none of us have even attempted on seeing if there is any cure," Hermione said, her cheeks flaring up in excitement.

Ginny, Harry and Ron were staring at her with incredulous looks.

"So, they are alright, otherwise?" Ginny asked. Hermione frowned.

"I don't see how my father's memory vanished from his mind is 'alright.'" Hermione said evenly.

"Well, I just meant-"

"Hermione, Ginny just meant physically," Harry said, interrupting. "You have to admit, your family is a lot better off than the first Death Eater attack two weeks ago. At least their lives were spared."

Hermione, for some unknown reason, flared up in anger.

"I don't know what's worse, Harry. My father being dead to me, or me being dead to my father."

­­­

* * *

The first thing Hermione did was formulate a theory. She constructed a plan for her research, of everything it would take to get it together. She began to formulate the plans for surgery first. She began her own campaign for the positivity of surgery in the wizarding world. She tried to be as organized and appealing as possible. She had never done this sort of thing before. She didn't know how to go about asking people for money. Which is why she saved Gringotts and the other large Wizarding banks around the world for last.

The board was a lost cause, told her there wasn't any more money to give out until the next year. She felt humiliated and dejected by her own company. Lied straight to her face.

Her first attempt in getting a sponsor was ridiculously humiliating. She stuttered and stammered, standing by her lonesome in a small room, her knees pressed together, her ankles seemingly connected, her hands wringing each other. She stumbled over her words as she watched the incredulous faces of the bank's panel. She nearly ran out of there crying, the malicious faces staring at her if she were a monster.

She wouldn't get her first sponsor for another three months. In-between then, she acquired her team. She interviewed the Cog Dep employees along the side of Dr. Patel, who left most of the hiring up to her.

From the English WWRC, she hired, of course, Becca, Jacob, and Henry. They were the only ones interested in taking her risky dive into the seams on the hybrid Muggle/Wizard world.

She contacted the Russian, American and French WWRCs and interviewed about another twenty employees, finally hiring from the American and French WWRCs.

Her team list consisted of:

Becca Abby (English WWRC)

Lauren Belle (American WWRC)

Henry Copland (English WWRC)

Geoffrey Lemeur (French WWRC)

Aaron Smith (American WWRC)

Jacob TWill (English WWRC)

And of course, Research Leader Hermione Granger.

Becca, Henry and Jacob were immediately assigned to the team where they began the research right away. The beginning stuff was just a lot of bookwork. They took trips to several national libraries in Europe to obtain as much information about the human brain as humanly possible. The foreign researchers would be relocated when there was enough money to pay for their salaries. But in the meantime, the English team was immersed in their books.

* * *

It would be two years of book work, research and cadaver dissection. Lots, and lots of _cadaver dissection_. Hermione was bloody sick of cadaver dissection. She dissected and analyzed every part of the brain: the cell structure, the parts of the brain where memory was stored, how the brain worked with memory.

They read over several cases of medical problems involving car accidents and other such tragedies where Muggles lost their memory to a harsh blow to the head. They worked on Short-Term Memory Loss for a good while until she was certain that the cases would not help their research in the slightest bit.

Her entire life was being poured into the life of this project. She sacrificed her weekends for interviews with private banks, trips to America, Belgium, Austria, France, everywhere for even the slightest amount of money.

By the time of her second year, she grew wearisome with the idea of more sponsor-hunting and worried for The Project's survival. Dr. Patel was seeming to have the same ideas.

He was always consulted Hermione daily about their budget and how close they were to their targeted goal. She had measured and counted for days until she came up with an appropriate goal that would suit the team eagerly. It wasn't until the skepticism was becoming to thick to work in did they get their first most sponsor.

Their greatest benefactor was a bank in America called Revars and Long. Aaron and Lauren had been scouting for Hermione while they worked in the American WWRC in the depths of West Virginia. Hermione formulated with them a contract in which they swore to promise enough funding for the next five years.

Once she had enough funding, Hermione was ready to finally proceed with her Project. She relocated her foreign team members to the English WWRC where they would begin the first step to her growing and idealistic plan.

When she was granted permission from Dr. Patel, she realized the dangers of going into the Wizarding world with surgery in hand blindly. There were too many differences between Muggle medicine and Wizarding medicine. She really couldn't just grab a scalpel and jab it at Wizards and expect them to cooperate. .

So, thus began her first invention: The scalpand, a medical tool that was a versatile medical instrument that substituted as any medical device. The wand could also perform several simple spells without the complications of the wand not matching its beholder.

Hermione had spent many months designing her instrument, hopefully a breakthrough in the modern medicine world.

The entire team was devoted to the first invention, each and every member having an idea of their own that could appropriately suit the invention in its own way. Mr. Ollivander was also hired for the creation of the scalpand. He helped to create the simple core of a scalpand. He educated Hermione in the versatility of certain ingredients that would ensure that the wand would not be biased to just one hand.

He also became a solid benefactor in The Project's baby days. He visited often, checking up on the progress of the operation he helped to conduct.

After creating the first step of The Project, there was the experimenting. They were not willing to perform neurotic surgery on live patients for fear of losing a life. But both Hermione, Becca and Aaron were opposed to performing surgery on animals. They feared that the end of the experiment would approach if they did not suck it up. They contacted several local wizarding animal hospitals and they all agreed to send over the animals who were confirmed to not live more that two or more weeks.

Hermione was given an anesthetic that made the animals sleep, then a drug they used to put dying animals to sleep. She signed contracts that agreed that once the animals served their research purpose, she would immediately put them to sleep (more like Geoffrey and Henry).

The sadness of performing on such a tame and domesticated animal distressed Hermione, but she would think of her father and everyone who was suffering with the pain of a loved one not remembering the faces they used to call beautiful.

Hermione wasn't sure what she looking for when she started hunting around the brain. She was looking for some sort of damage, broken nerves, hieroglyphics...just _something. _

Her heart ached with the aggravation of not finding anything and wanting to find something so bad. It wasn't until late April, nearly three years since The Project had began, did she find something.

It was explosive. She was performing on a calico cat, when her yelp of surprise startled the scalpels out of everyone's hands.

"Oh, God. Oh, God, Oh, my _God!" _she exclaimed in pure and utter shock. She had her eyes under a microscopic spell, so reversed the spell and motioned for her team to come look.

"Charm your eyes and look in the center," she said breathlessly. "Do you see them? The little purple clusters?"

Lauren gasped audibly and Jacob cursed quite loudly. They both turned to Hermione where they enveloped her in a hug. She put down her scalpand while the seven of them twirled, bopped and jumped around in utter excitement.

Dr. Patel joined them in the ruckus, trying to get someone to talk without screaming in excitement. He grasped Hermione by the wrist and pulled her to the side.

"What is going on?" he tried to ask sternly, but the grins of everyone, Hermione's being the brightest, was contagious and he couldn't help but given in a smile himself.

"We found something. Here, let me show you," she said, taking his hand and leading him to the cat. Dr. Patel charmed his eyes to zoom in and observe.

What Dr. Patel was looking at was what looked like dark, purple encasings around the membranes of the brain cells. They were formed in small, clusters that were staggered around the lobes of the brain.

He looked up incredulous. Hermione let another bright, white smile gleam from her.

"I have no idea if these are lesions or even a tumor, but it's something and after nearly there years, just a little bit of something is a really big something," she said, rambling.

* * *

That evening Hermione was to meet up with the team at a local pub to celebrate their findings and her birthday that weekend. But first, she wanted to stop by the hospital. Her father had been in room 334 for the past two years now, his mind too unstable and confused to do anything but be contained to a hospital room. The room was nicely furnished, with carpeted floors instead of the hard tile of the ER. There were thick red curtains and a twin bed with a matching duvet.

Hermione and her mum had argued with the doctors that he should have come home, back to where he belonged, but it was against Patrick's free will. He didn't want to return to a house he never remembered belonging to. As more and more isolated he had become, the more unstable his sanity became.

He slept all of the time, had gained a considerable amount of weight and refused to claim Helen as his wife or Hermione as his daughter.

Which is why Hermione checked to see if her father was asleep before entering the warm room. She hated coming here, to see him in the same position every week, wilting flowers from the nurses at his practice set aside on a bedroom side table with stacks and stacks of books. She got her love of books from her father, who taught her of realms where fairies do exist and of fields of flowers where she could run trough without hesitation, worlds that she'll never forget.

Hermione dragged a visitor's chair up to her father's sleeping side. She stared at her father, confusion etched into his features, even in his sleep.

"We've made a breakthrough, Daddy," she whispered quietly, as not to wake him. "I believe that if were to find some way to disfigure these shells around your brain cells, you might be able to remember Mum or me. I promise that I'll figure it out. I promise that you won't go on with this life, you won't go on, pushing away your memory of us. We'll be here, always."

She then grabbed the book off of the top of one of the towering stacks. She found that it was _Wuthering Heights. _She grinned to herself, laughing through tears. Hermione's mother read this to her when she was pregnant with Hermione. Her Dad would tell her about how he was lulled to sleep by the words of Emily Bronte, the voice of Helen Granger and the idea of Hermione Granger.

Surely he remembered _something. _Either way, Hermione opened the book and started at a bookmarked page.

"_They were much too absorbed in their unusual joy to suffer their embarrassment..."_

* * *

Hermione nicknamed them Shelbeys. She started off calling them shields, which is what would go down in a formal textbook, but at the lab, shields transformed into Shelley, then to Shelbey.

The lab sounded a lot like this:

"Did you get that Shelbey last night, Jacob?"

"How about cutting that Shelbey out for now?'

"These groups of Shelbeys are more lavender than violet."

"Quick, before Shelbey 1 and Shelbey 2 die, get them in the vials!"

The data was enormous. Now that they knew what to look for, the evidence was evident everywhere. The banks anted up their profit for the next round of surgery, Hermione's budget growing to enormous numbers.

The shields were basically walls that surrounded the brain cells in a multitude of dozens blustered together. They were seemingly un-penetrable, strong and lifeless.

Seeing that the last three dozen animals were kept in stable condition and woke up from surgery after being healed from their state, Hermione and Dr. Patel decided to upgraded to human volunteers.

She was surprised at how many people signed up for the position. Sure, it was high paying, but they could possibly die. I guess they all believed that magic was going to save them even when Hermione stretched the fact that dying was such a huge risk. They'd also lose their hair in the process. Shaving their heads made it much easier to operate.

Hermione was elated when their first four humans lived. She was also elated that in all four, she found the curious group of purple cells. Each volunteer responded well, their answers generally the same, their memory cut off around the same time. They would come back every two weeks in search for complications or infection. There was none.

The team also noticed that the obliviation spells were located in almost the exact same areas as all of the four brains. It was Jacob who conducted the idea that certain memories were distributed in certain areas of the brain. Such like, the oldest memories are stored in the back of one lobe, closer to the center and the more recent memories were located near the front, closer to the surface. They didn't have time to prod this theory.

Their fifth volunteer died. There were some serious complications that didn't closely relate to the surgery, but in the end Tabitha McCrown died on her way to the hospital.

Hermione took a week off of worc which meant that the entire team took a week off of worc. She spent the days in bed, processing the life that was lost that day. How the wire that hung in the air counting her heartbeats had started buzzing sporadically at insanely faster rates. Hermione immediately healed her scalp, removing all instruments and closing it, but the sporadic buzzing wouldn't stop.

Hermione Apparated her to the hospital, levitating her to the doctors, but it was too late. Tabitha McCrown, nineteen years old with dark, dyed blue hair that she had to shave away, died because of her surgery.

Dr. Patel came to drag her out of home one day during the week. She thought that it was to yell at her then told her if she didn't come back to worc, that he would fire her. Instead, he waltzed out of her fireplace, startling her sleeping form on the couch and inspired her to come back to worc.

He kneeled beside her like he did when he gave her the news about her father those years ago, told her how important the project she had started was to him. More important than _his _baby. The difference in the minds of Muggles and Wizards. He told her how important the project was going to be to the wizarding world. How not only was it going to completely change the war still-to-come, but it was going to modify Wizarding science and medicine. They had a Wizarding revolutionary right under their noses.

He told her how Tabitha McCrown had been a heroin addict for, what the coroner had said, possibly two years now. There were complications with the nervous system, the drugs used in the lab, and even the spells used. That there was nothing she could've done, Tabitha McCrown was going to die either way.

Hermione still cried into her hands, mourned the soul of Tabitha McCrown and wished there was something she could've done.

Dr. Patel pulled Hermione's hands from her face, cupping her wet palms in his hands. After a long, mysterious kiss, Dr. Patel became just James.

* * *

The war had not come yet. The Wizarding world was slowly letting their guard down, for the rumor was old, the preparation was useless. They felt like they were waiting for something that wasn't going to come.

Years passed and Hermione waltzed in and out of breakthroughs for The Project, but the pace was slowing down. They lost Geoffrey to a better engagement in Marine Sciences in Turkey, but the rest of the team held steadfast, working through weddings, children and relationships.

Hermione only tested animal subjects for the time being. Her spells were becoming too experimental, gory even, when cast. For four more years, she compiled down reject spells, antidotes, potions. The only thing that kept her going was her team's support and the thought of her saddened, mindless father alone in room 334.

She continued seeing James, although it was a private affair. Worc was not involved in their relationship. Sure, they discussed it outside of the labs, but their affection was left outside the main entrance to WWRC.

Hermione never actually thought that the relationship would ever be serious, for he was going on thirty-two and he would probably soon be searching for a wife to accompany him throughout the rest of her life, which Hermione could never devote herself to. She made a promise to the Order, and nothing would keep her from fighting when the time was right.

Besides, Hermione wanted to see too much. Marriage was not an option for her. A real relationship was not an option for her. James, to her, was an object to crave. A whirlwind that she was caught up in.

It was in her seventh year of the Project when she made the final breakthrough. She was twenty-four years old, going on twenty-five, and was conjuring some interesting results.

She was wrapped under the sheets with a sleeping James when she threw herself from him in a sudden revelation. She quickly jotted down what had flitted through her mind in the moments between consciousness and sleep. She threw on a robe and insisted that James Apparate to the lab with her. He grudgingly obliged.

She hastily unlocked the laboratory doors, flicking a light over her table on, then dashing into the back room only to returned with a softly mewing cat. She had been waiting to perform on this particular cat with her lovely black coat with glistened even in the single, glistening blue light that hung over the stainless steel table. The poor feline had a growing tumor in her large intestines, her life span dwindling by the hour. She gingerly set the cat down, keeping as much pressure off of her stomach as possible.

James was mumbling about being dragged out of bed by the woman who had been at once peacefully sleeping beside him, but was now running around the lab in _his _bathrobe, caressing a cat that she was going to put to sleep anyway.

Hermione shot him a dark glare and threw the coat over the robe and put on her gloves. She generously put the cat to sleep and began the surgery. She cast ten obliviation charms as standard procedures persisted. She took out the pocketed piece of paper, and constructed her spell. Geoffrey had gone to an incredibly prestigious charms school in France in which they all took turns attending for a half-year course on how to construct spells from certain elements.

The construction of the spell took about a half of an hour with Hermione being so anxious. James had nagged her for a while before dozing off behind her desk. But she nervously checked and rechecked the spell to see if it was perfect. With a deep breath and a prayer to whoever was listening, she swished her wand in the manner she thought would be right.

Closing her eyes, she charmed her eyes to focus in on the cells of the brain. Her heart stopped. She checked, rechecked, but there it was. Or there it wasn't. Before her eyes, the purple shield was deteriorating before her eyes. She uncharmed her eyes and leaned back. She searched for something lean on but missed and tumbled to the ground. The clatter woke James.

"Hermione?"

"Hrmmmph?" came her response. He walked around the operating table to see her sitting on the floor in a heap, staring off into space with a glossy gaze. He kneeled down beside her.

"You alright, love?" he asked. She turned to him, her gaze glossy with daze, but with tears.

"We did it. The...the...shield...the shield is gone. Her cells, they're right there, no purple shield. They're gone," she said with a teary apprehension. His eyes went wide. With a whoop, he stood up, scooped her up into his arms.

Together they laughed, screamed, and whooped at their findings. They had done it.

* * *

Now, Hermione was going into the surgery she had created. Becca, now Dr. Abby, was going to perform the procedure they had perfected over the past seven years (well, now it was eight, Hermione just didn't remember the last one).

Hermione decided she wanted her to do it. Nearly the entire team had received their doctorates in the fourteen months she was gone, but she wanted Becca to do it. She realized that without her, research had stopped, but the data was saved and protected. Becca seemed to be the only one who fully understood what Hermione was babbling about with the spell. She had talked to all of them and finally decided that Dr. Abby was her best choice.

She had been prepped, taken the drugs she remembered distinctly giving to all five human patients of hers. She had talked to her team, the closest friends she had. Harry and Ron were gone. Not literally gone, but the Order had relocated them five months ago. They probably didn't know she was back.

Her team had told her stories of what happened when she was gone, how afraid they were for her. How afraid they were for her now. They were afraid of what she would encounter when she got her memory back. She was afraid, too.

But the nurse called Dr. Abby to surgery. Becca turned to her and kissed her on the top of her bare head, a symbol of everything they went through together. She gave her a nervous wink as she left with the nurse. Hermione hugged each and every one of her team before she left with the second nurse that had come to retrieve her.

Hermione wrapped her arms around herself and stored away the memory of what it was like to not remember anything.

* * *

AN- Alright, there you go. It's going to be at least little confusing, but if it's _too _confusing please let me know. Let me know what you think of the idea and the layout. And remember- I have Chapter Three... I'm just looking for five measley reviews and I'll post it. :)


	4. Something Stupid

AN- Okay, so I kind of screwed the whole "five reviews" thing, since the outlook wasn't too bright. So, I just figured, if I have readers, I'm okay. But if you're out there, please review. I hope you enjoy.

* * *

**The Project. Something Stupid**

She dreamed easily when she was under. The images were odd and unparallel.

_A round sticker with a few numbers on it and the words "Pink Lady." _

_A bouncing stone across several streams, continuously bouncing from parallel steam to parallel stream. _

_"2600 Thread Count."_

_A fireplace poker gleaming in priceless metals._

_Red chipped nail polish._

_She was standing on the beach, the sun peaking up over the horizon somewhere. Lavender splotches were decorating the dark, glistening sky. She was tracing words in the sand with her toes, giggling with giddiness and intoxication. Her pale foot was pointed, the smaller toes bunched at the top while her big toe with chipping red nail polish traced unknown words. She was laughing at someone. She started dancing, twirling, leaping, twirling for someone. She said something mean to someone._

_Her hands were gripping a stonewall. Despair was flooding her. Her nails clung to the jagged stones while her head was pressed into her elbow. Her body shook against the hard concrete floor. There was water dripping somewhere. No windows. No light. No sound but the harsh wails that were escaping her throat. _

_Clover patches._

_A painting of a room with ballerinas, an abandoned violin case and a large mirror._

She woke up to the gradual buzzing of her heart monitor. She looked up at the string that hung in the air over her head. Up and down it went, buzzing with each up.

She propped herself up on her pillows trying to blink away her grogginess. The room was dark, lit by one small candle beside her head. There was also a clock sitting next to her candle. It read four-thirty, but even then, a medi-witch in her usual uniform walked into the room holding a potion. She looked up at Hermione in surprise.

"Oh, hello, dear. We didn't expect you up for another couple of hours. I suppose being around those chemicals everyday gives you a bit of an immunity to it," she said absentmindedly. Hermione watched her as she bustled around the room. She had brought her own candle. Evidently they kept the castle dark in the night. Hermione tried speaking but the noise came out hoarse. She cleared her throat.

"H-how did the...um...surgery go?" she asked timidly. The nurse had begun to mix certain potions and handed them back to her. She looked up over her shoulder with a hesitant expression. She hummed a moment before turning back to her work.

"Well, it went positively well, I would suppose. I don't agree much with the whole surgery thing. It's not proper to go slicing people open like that. People are people and people don't like to see other people with their heads cut open like grapefruit like so," she rambled. Hermione was beginning to think that the nurse herself was a grapefruit. "No offense, Dr. Granger-"

"It's not Doctor. Just Miss," Hermione corrected. The nurse cleared her throat, covering the sound of a knife against a cutting board, no doubt cutting something up for a potion. Even though she had heard the sound many, many times throughout her life, she couldn't help but feel like she was in a bad horror movie. Candles, a crazy nurse, knives and cutting boards. Yes, her hands were getting sweaty.

"I beg your pardon, Miss Granger. But as I was saying, there's no offense to you as the creator of this surgery business. I just think it's absurd, you know? I guess you don't. I don't understand why you would cut anyone up to begin with. It's just creepy. Can I ask you a question, Miss Granger?" she asked, turning around with a tray in her hands. Hermione looked at her with caution but nodded anyway.

What was the name of that movie? _Misery? _Yes, that was it. That was the movie she felt like she was in right now. Bloody Stephen King. Creepy as hell.

The nurse set the tray down by the bed handing her a vial that looked like one of many. Hermione recognized almost all of them. Three of them were added to the surgery process by her team as recovery potions during the volunteer surgery period. The other three were unrecognizable. She took one vial and sniffed it when the nurse was rearranging the other vials. It was okay.

"Why would you invent such an absurd idea? I thought you were supposed to be a grand, intelligent witch. Not morbid and sick," she said.

Hermione supposed that the question would have come off as caustic from anyone other than her nurse. Maybe it was the uniform, the red lipstick and the long-lashes, but the question came off sweet and lighthearted. Hermione downed the potion before answering.

"I didn't invent surgery. Surgery has been around for centuries in the Muggle world. I didn't _invent _the idea of 'cutting people up,'" she said a bit bitterly. The nurse nodded while handing her a second vial. Sniff, sniff, down.

"I see. Those Muggles, such au- Well, I best keep my mouth shut with the raging war and all," she said. "I trust you to take your potions?" Her smile was big and sweet. Her hair curled over one eye and her hat sat on her head like an American nurse in the forties. She looked like Fix Me Barbie, with flawless lipstick and perfect batting lashes. And that strawberry-blonde hair.

Hermione touched her own baldhead that was actually bearing its own peach fuzz. "I noticed you sniffing your potions." Her smile disappeared. "We're not trying to poison you, Miss Granger. We're not crazy enough to do that."

_Yeah, you had me fooled._

She turned on her pretty little heels and crossed the room.

"Dr. Abby will be in soon. And in case you're wondering, MAAR added the last three potions to the curriculum while you were...well, while you were gone," she said. "She told me you would be suspicious." And with that she left.

Hermione scowled. She hated the term "MAAR." It was so...ick. She tilted her head back and sucked down another potion. That damn nurse didn't even answer her question. As she brought another vial to her mouth, she realized what exactly her surgery had been for. Her hand fell to her lap and she began to think.

The smiling face of Becca. The fluorescent lights. Walking down the hall with the nurse. Talking with the team. Sitting in her room by herself. Meeting with her parents. The Order. The trial. Waking up in the hospital that week ago.

Stop.

Stop.

Black.

_"We did it!"_

Hermione's breath hitched in her throat. Where were they? Where were the past fourteen months? Hermione's brow furrowed as she fast forwarded through her mind, and rewound, back and forth. There was nothing but fogginess. Tears blurred her vision. She whipped out of bed, the vial slipping out of her hand and tumbling to the ground, shattering against the concrete.

She dashed out the room, hearing the buzzing string go staticy and rise to a loud and monotone beep. She looked down the dark hall until she saw a candle at the end. She ran toward it, her heart beating, her mind racing, then stopping, stalling and speeding up again. There was nothing there.

She fell at the person's feet, too hysterical to notice who it was. Tears fell into her hands, her brain too confused to tell her that she was being ridiculous. The person kneeled down by her, the candle set down by her feet. She looked up, her face glistening in the flicker. It was Becca.

The raven-haired woman took Hermione into her arms, her own face crumpling.

"I don't know, Hermione. I just don't know," she said, her voice cracking. Hermione pushed her away.

"What do you mean 'you don't know?'" Hermione exclaimed. Becca looked down at her hands. Tears fell onto the lenses of her black-rimmed glasses. Microscoping your eyes as often as they did for The Project isn't good for the eyes. She looked up, took the glasses off and looked Hermione in the eye.

"I did it like we did so many times. It's like breathing to me now. But, but- we went through it. My hands are even used to it. But when we started looking for the cells. The shields... Hermione, they weren't there," she said, her hazel eyes penetrating Hermione.

Hermione once again woke up in the hospital, but this time the room was glistening with afternoon sun. There was a wall to ceiling window that gathered light from the outside and sent it shimmering into her room. She leaned into her pillow, squeezing her puffy eyes shut. She must have fainted in the hallway. She remembered her breakdown at four in the morning. And that psychotic nurse. She sighed. What could've gone wrong with the surgery?

She heard movement and in walked Becca. Hermione gave her a sad smile. Becca stared at her sympathetically because you already used sad in her white Doctor robes. Hermione figured she must have looked terrible. With her insanely itching head of growing hair, puffy eyes and tiny frame being sucked into the bed. She had lost a ton of weight wherever she was.

Hermione sat up and patted her bed, insinuating that Becca should sit. She did.

Becca took Hermione's hand with a heavy sigh. There was a gloom in the room, even with the bright and brilliant sunshine.

"Becca, what happened?" Hermione asked softly. Becca looked up at the ceiling and blinked as if the answer was written there cryptically.

"There wasn't anything there, Hermione," she said quietly. Hermione gazed at her intently.

"I don't understand," she said slowly. Becca turned her face down to Hermione's and bit her lip.

"I looked for two hours, but you were due to wake up in an hour, and I didn't want to risk it. So, I stopped. But I double checked both lobes. There was nothing there. No purple shields, nothing," she said hopelessly. Hermione's heart sank.

"Nothing," she said. It wasn't a question. Just a statement. "But I didn't have any brain damage. I was fine. No concussions, head trauma. There wasn't anything! How could there be _nothing?" _Hermione exclaimed, raising her voice.

At that moment, someone walked into the room, causing both Hermione and Becca to look up. Hermione's breath hitched in her throat. It was James.

"Dr. Patel," Becca greeted. "How are you?"

He ignored her, as his eyes were trained on Hermione. Hermione gave him an easy smile. It had been fourteen months since she had seen him, and he had changed. His brown skin crinkled around his eyes, his brow was furrowed, his lips pulled down in a frown. She didn't feel those fourteen months, but it was evident that he had.

James just stood in the doorway, wearing casual wizarding clothes. Becca looked between the two of them and with a heavy sigh, she pushed herself up, squeezed Hermione's hand and left. There was still much to talk about.

As soon as Becca left the room, James walked slowly to Hermione's bed. Hermione wanted to hide from him. Once, she had been reasonably pretty, now she was a bald, skinny and sickly-looking..._thing. _Her brow furrowed when James sat down on the corner of her bed gazing at her intently.

"Hey," he breathed. He looked troubled, sad, pained. Anything but happy to see her.

"Hi," she said quietly.

There was an awkward silence. The sat staring at each other, their similar brown eyes dancing across each other's faces looking at everything different. He looked at the top of her head and smiled. His hand reached up to cup the side of her head. He leaned over and kissed the top of her baby-fuzzy head. She smiled sadly up at him.

"I miss it," she said with a small laugh.

"It's befitting," he said simply. Hermione began laughing louder. He smirked at her. "No, it makes your eyes look bigger. Granted..." he trailed off, tracing the hallow of her cheekbones, malnourishment evident through the gauntness of her face. Hermione felt her heart drop at, again, another silent approach to the seeming horrors that were abandoned from her memory.

"I'm sorry," he said. Hermione laughed bitterly.

"I suppose I could only be offended if I actually remembered what would be so offending," Hermione said with a bit of an edge. James tensed a bit.

"We'll figure it out. You'll get out of here, come back to worc and we'll start up The Project research again. We'll find out why the surgery failed," James said more to the floor than to her.

_Failure? _That's it. It _was _a failure. Hermione didn't have time to think about it that way. But it was, in everyway. Her heart sank from her stomach to her knees. Her left one, specifically. It seemed to be aching lately whenever she sat too long. She'd get up and it would crack painfully. It only seemed fitting that her poor, sad heart would reside in her left knee, abandoning her chest cavity like her memory had abandoned her.

"Hermione?" Hermione snapped out of her thoughts and looked at James in the face. That same worried, sad look that everyone gave her. She suddenly didn't want to see him anymore. "It'll be fine."

"I'm sick of hearing that, James. My dad has had his memory destroyed for eight years now. How can I have any faith that I will be any different?" she said icily. James' face fell. He didn't have any optimism for that.

He stood up, his body seeming to be ten pounds heavier than when he arrived.

"Your job is waiting for you when you're ready," he said before turning out and leaving.

_Her eyes peeled open to the greeting of fluorescent bulbs over head and the gentle buzzing of the heart rate monitor above. The light was pale and sickening, but the room was silent other than the buzzing of both operations. She pushed herself up, immediately recognizing that she was in a hospital. St. Mungo's to exact. _

_She looked around for anyone, but there was no one. She searched herself for injuries. First her head, touching around for any bandages, which made her notice the gauze wrapped around her right wrist. Bleach white, tightly bound and reaching up to her elbow. She then found more gauze right above her left collarbone, reaching around to the back of her neck. _Okay, that hurts, _said a signal when she touched the gauzy patch. _

What in Gos's name happened to me? _she thought. And she thought, and she thought. She couldn't think straight, for nothing was coming to her. Just some dull darkness. _

_Then a nurse walked in, her robes fluttering lazily behind her. Following her was a man in Auror robes. Her stomach pitted. Aurors were never a good sign. _

_"Oh, good. She _is _awake. I told you she was due to wake any minute, now," said the blonde with a cute smile. She turned to Hermione. "How are you, sweetie?" she asked. Hermione felt like she was in a terrible dream. _

Oh, I'm just peachy. I just woke up in St. Mungo's wrapped up like an Egyptian Queen who happened to perish an uncountable amount of years ago, I can't recall anything that might've happened to me within the past few hours, and I could have possibly been admitted as a psychotic patient as far as I know. Other than that, _darlin'_, I'm just _perfect. _

_Hermione just blinked at her. _

_"That good, huh? Well, Auror Davidson, please don't ask too many questions. Doctor Larren's orders," she said before leaving Hermione with the supposed Auror Davidson. He walked up to her bed and held out his hand while pulling out a quill and a miniature roll of parchment used for taking notes. _

_"I'm Auror Samuel Davidson and if you don't mind, I would like to ask you a few questions," he said. Hermione took his big hand and shook it. _

_"Uh, sure," Hermione said, a bit startled. Auror interrogation was not anything she was looking forward to. _

_Auror Davidson was a tall, lean black man with surprising green eyes and thin lips that didn't seem to smile much. He was on the older side, the black hair around his temples tinted a light shade of gray. He looked like he'd seen a lot in his years. _

_"How do you know Draco Malfoy?" he asked. _

_Hermione was completely caught off guard. _

Shit, did _he _do this to me? _she thought with panic. She stumbled through her words. _

_"I- I- uh... We went to school together at Hogwarts. We were in the same year. We...erm...didn't get along, to put it lightly," she said timidly. _

_"When was the last time you saw Draco Malfoy?" he asked. _

_"Graduation day, 2002. No, no, wait. About three years ago, I ran into him in Diagon Alley. He runs that potions business, yes?" Hermione stated. Something flashed across Davidson's face. He put the roll he was jotting notes down on down and looked at her. _

_"Miss Granger, what do you remember of the last fourteen months?" he asked. Hermione's brow furrowed. Fourteen? Alright, whatever he said. _

_"Well, I've been in the lab mostly, working on The Project-" oh, God. The Project! She had figured it out. She just remembered. "I, uh- Auror Davidson, I do need to go. Do you have any idea when I can be discharged?"_

_A sad look flitted across his face. He looked to the chair next to her bed. "May I sit?" he asked. Hermione shrugged._

_"Sure, but I've really got to go," she said hurriedly, starting to push back the covers. _

_"Miss Granger, I think you should stay," he said with a kinder tone. "The Project can wait. In fact, it's been waiting for the past fourteen months." Hermione tightened around the mouth. _

_"I don't understand. I-" _

_"Miss Granger, what is the _last _thing you remember?" he cut her off. Hermione tried to think. She was with James that glorious morning with her favorite cat. Her _favourite _cat. That cat had solved the riddle for her. With her. No. Wait, she remembered getting up in the morning with James. She had to return to her respective home bidding James goodbye. Then what? She tried this on Davidson. _

_"I- uh- I was in the lab early in the morning, four-ish. We had a breakthrough. We decided that celebrating was better at times when people were actually awake, so we went back to bed. I woke up, went home. Then..." Hermione paused. "Oh, yes. I wanted to go see Mr. Ollivander before I told anyone else. He helped the team enormously in the beginning. I told him that I would keep him updated."_

_"And?" Davidson pushed. Hermione tried to think. _

_"I remember leaving..." she trailed off, her eyes glazing over. She closed her eyes trying to push her mind further. Her eyes flipped open. "I- I- uh I can't believe this. I don't remember," she said hopelessly. _

_"Miss Granger, what day was that?" he asked. He had picked up his pad again and was jotting down notes. _

_"Thursday?" she guessed. He smiled a bit._

_"What day, as in the date?" he asked again._

_"Oh...February 25th. Yeah, I wrote it down," she said._

_"Year?" he asked. Hermione's heart skipped a beat. Why on earth would he ask that?_

_"2009," she stated simply. _

_"And that is the very last day you remember?" he asked. _

_"Yes, it is. How many days have I been in here?" she asked bewildered. Davidson straightened, began to look professional. He started to look staged and practiced. _

_"Miss Granger, today is May 3rd, 2010. You have been in St. Mungo's for three days now."_

_­­­­­­­­­Hermione's world began to spin. "Huh?" was the only thing that made it out of her mouth. _

_"I'm assuming that you do not remember the past fourteen months and eight days?" he asked calmly. Hermione's breathing started coming in short pants. _

_"What? As in the year 2010? No, of course I don't remember it! I don't remember Halloween, summertime, Christmas or even the New Year!" she shouted. "I don't remember turning 25, oh...God. I don't even remember turning 26! Four days ago, wasn't it?" Hermione began to become irrational. _

_"Miss Granger, I kindly ask you to lower your voice and I will explain to you the complications," he said. _

_Hermione straightened, bit her lip and ignored the idea of crying. She stared ahead, the idea of Auror Davidson in her peripheral vision. _

_"You disappeared February 25, 2009 and were declared missing the 27th. You were missing for fourteen months. I was the head of the investigation, but with the war, very little could be done. Wherever you were, you weren't going to be found, not if someone could help it. Your case went cold after seven months. In the midst of the war, the best we could do was pronounce you still missing, but the statistics saw you as dead," he stated sadly. _

_Hermione's lip began to quiver and tears threatened her vision. She blinked them away. "Missing?" she breathed. He nodded. "War?" she choked. He sighed. _

_"The war was declared February 26th from the light side. Harry Potter's doing. After all, you do know her was assigned Head Auro.," Hermione nodded numbly. "The rages have been going on ever since with no end in sight. You have woken up in a very dark world," he said somberly. _

_Hermione was ready to cry, but she didn't want to break down in front of anybody. Davidson must have noticed her breakdown coming. _

_"I will be back tomorrow to further question you or if you have any further questions," he rose up out of his chair, tucking his notes in his robe pockets and nodding towards her in good riddance. Once he left the room, not even a door would cover the sounds of her sobs. _

Hermione was discharged from the hospital the next day, sent off with a week's worth of potions. She was instructed to meet with Becca every other day to check the incision, which was nonexistent. But there were many causes for infection, complications many things that aroused in studies of the animals in The Project.

Hermione had been living with her mum since she was discharged from the hospital a week ago. Her flat had been sold in her absence, her belongings sent to a warehouse, life disappearing off the monitor.

On the way home from the hospital after the surgery, Hermione stared out the window watching familiar buildings whiz by, her heart taking comfort in things she could remember. The doctor said this was best for her, remaining in her childhood residence. The comfort of things she could remember would assist her in the process of coping.

_Coping with what? _she remembered thinking. _There is nothing to cope with. _

The Catholic church she attended as a kid stood proudly with high arches and stainless glass. It really was an amazing structure. She remembered walking in, her small hand in her mother's watching as Helen reached over her daughter's hand, dipping her middle and ring fingers into the small sterling silver there is in fact a word for these things: look it up, Al and wetting her fingers, she crossed herself, kissing her fingers in an _Amen, _and proceeded. Before Hermione could be dragged along with her, she imitated her mother, getting too much on her fingers and a water droplet trailing down her forehead into the crook of her nose.

Hermione walked up the stairs, her steps heavy and dull. Her mum had attempted conversation, but she was used to the behavior. She knew how to act around a patient of the sort. After eight years, she had become an expert. Hermione pushed open the white door. The smell of her room floated up to meet her.

The window had been open that morning, the cool, May morning air sifting around, playing with the white, transparent curtains that fluttered against the dark, wooden panels of her floor. The full bed sat in the middle of the room, a large white comforter inviting Hermione to fall down on it. Small purple flowers were embroidered on the large buttons on the top. Hermione sat on the edge of the bed and fiddled with them.

_2600 thread count. Egyptian cotton. _

_"There's such a thing?"_

Hermione gasped and slammed her eyes shut. Orange danced in her eyelids. She reached out for the image, her body physically inching forward. She began to whimper when she realized that she couldn't get it back. She didn't remember what triggered it or what was even triggered. _There was a number, count, count. Do what you were doing before. _

Hermione opened her eyes and began fiddling with the blanket again. No such luck. She even sat there and began to count. The wind came in an out as she counted.

_1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6..._

The wall opposite her was simply white, as most of her room was. The wall stretched endlessly in her mind. The spotless white stretching her mind.

_234, 235, 236..._

Cars whizzed by, the sound reaching her ear through her window.

_766, 767, 768..._

The breeze tickled her face. If she had hair, the wind would've picked it up and drifted rebel strays across her nose.

_1,655; 1,656; 1,657_...

She heard her mum bustling in the kitchen. Making cookies, no doubt. She baked when she was nervous.

_2,433; 2,434; 2,-_

"Hermione, honey, would you like to come down and help me?"

Hermione blinked and sighed. Surely, the number wasn't higher than that. It was probably nothing. Just a dream she had. She pushed herself up and carried herself down the stairs.

Hermione rolled the dough over her fingers, massaging the flour into the butter.

"What did you do, Mum?" Hermione asked suddenly staring into the bowl.

"Hmmm?" she asked, looking up from her own bowl of simply sugar cookies. Hermione was doing double chocolate-chip.

Hermione's parents, or mum rather, owned a large home in England that suited them for the past thirty years. Helen had recently remolded, the house needing an update. The kitchen was modern with dark granite countertops, cool, cherry wood flooring and stainless steel appliances. It was her indulgence for the past eight years.

Patrick had never really wanted to get around to it. Helen had been hesitant to do it, always wanting to keep everything the same in reverence of Patrick's memory. But one day, a few months after the attack, Helen had been in the garage on a weekend, looking for her old easel when she had a breakdown. She took one of Patrick's sludge hammers to the white oak cabinets in the kitchen. Specifically, the cabinets that contained the wedding china.

One of the neighbors heard the racket and came to check on Helen. She found her crumpled on the kitchen floor shaking violently and hyperventilating, cradling a teacup that had been salvaged somehow. One-half of the kitchen lay in ruins, the sludge hammer discarded in weariness. She was surrounded by shattered porcelain, glass and splintered wood.

The neighbor assumed that Helen was having a seizure and called and ambulance while she tried to console her. The doctors said Helen had a panic attack and sent her to therapy and put her on anxiety medication. Helen skipped the therapy and remodeled the kitchen.

But now, Hermione and Helen were standing in the kitchen, their bowls sitting on the island in the kitchen, massaging ingredients into comfort food. Helen's long curly hair was pulled back into a pony tail, the ruthless curls cascading down her back.

"When I, uh... disappeared. What did you do?" Hermione asked, not looking up from her bowl. Helen stopped her mixing and leaned on the island, her blue eyes searching Hermione.

"I freaked. Quite simply," she said sadly.

Hermione finally looked up. There was silence for a moment. Her mother seemed to look for what she was going to say.

"I had expected a phone call from you that Friday morning, like always, but when I didn't get it, I didn't worry too much. I knew that you were preoccupied with WWRC. I had gotten an entirely different phone call that night, though. It was from Dr. Patel. James. I had remembered him from our chats. I nagged and nagged you to bring him to dinner. But would you? No.

"Anyway, he called and asked if I had seen you. And I hadn't, not since Sunday when we made our hospital visit. Then he told me that he was filing a missing persons report to the Aurors. I've seen enough of those men in my lifetime than I find comfortable. He hadn't heard from you since the morning before. He said that you had made a breakthrough and that he thought that maybe you needed some time by yourself, but then he realized that there was no way that you would miss out on the productivity. He began looking for you, but you were nowhere to be found.

"By that time I was having another panic attack, but I ignored it enough to call the police and file a missing person's report with the police department here. I kept strong for a while, doing everything in my power to keep the search organized and helpful enough. I found pictures, clothing, told them everything I knew. But it obviously wasn't enough." Helen looked at the dough with resentment. Hermione sighed. She wanted to hug her mother, but she found that ever since she woke up, physical fondness was uncomfortable for her.

"Mum, look, of course it was enough. I'm here, aren't I?" she said helplessly. Helen smiled at her.

"Fourteen months, Hermione. What in God's name kept you for fourteen months?" Helen began to cry. Images of what could've happened in those fourteen months were constantly flashing through her mind. Terrible, horrible things that flashed across the news daily. Hermione finally pulled her mother to her in a tight embrace.

"I don't want you to remember, Hermione," she said into her shoulder. Hermione pulled her mother back with a pained expression.

"Oh, Hermione. I want you so bad to be able to remember. But for your sanity's sake, I think it's better that you _don't _know."

"How can you _say _that, Mum?" Hermione asked, hurt.

"You don't know what happened to you in that hell, Hermione. There's no telling what horrors happened to you. What scarring you were open to," Helen said, pulling away and working on her cookies again.

"Mother, you have no idea how horrible it is _not _to remember. There is no horror out there worse than not knowing," she said, angry.

"Hermione, I _know. _I may not know first -hand, but I've seen it. Every Sunday for the past eight years," she said with an edge to her voice. Hermione looked at her mum guiltily, but not correcting herself. "What if you were raped? What about spells? What if you were tortured, used? Discarded?" Helen asked, her voice cracking on every last syllable. Hermione looked away.

"I need to remember. To condemn Malfoy rightfully," Hermione said quietly.

"I agree, honey. But he is in a coma. They are saying he's retreating into a vegetable state, that he won't _ever _wake up. There's nothing to condemn," she said quietly.

"You don't want justice? He could have raped me. He could've tossed me to Death Eaters that had their way with me. There are several ways to torture a witch with magic that leaves no mark on her body. It's all up here," she tapped her baldhead. "And you're telling me that it's best that he'll remain in a hospital cell, his head wrapped up like a fucking infant where he'll die and his name will live forever as Draco Malfoy, man who owned an immense empire of potion production and founded the wizarding school in Uganda for the 'needy?' Not as the man who triggered the most catastrophic war in history?" Hermione spat out viciously.

Helen looked hurt and wounded. Attacked.

"Of course I don't think that, Hermione," she said meekly. Hermione shook her head and left the kitchen, her agitation to high to communicate properly anymore.

­­­­­­­­­­

Hermione drove for a while. Her hands gripped the steering wheel, her eyes focused on the sparkling pavement. It was dusk now, the sky a calm lavender, the shadows enveloping the world. The road stretched beyond her, empty and endless, only vast trees surrounding her.

Her father's SUV was an old model, but it ran well, the growling of the engine carrying her into another world. One where Draco Malfoy was in Azkaban, her father was her father again, and she never disappeared. She was alive and well, married, happy. Traveling the world to hell.

Hermione looked through her father's CD's, pulling a random one out and shoving it into the player. The first track opened with a guitar strung with Italian technique.

"_I know I stand in line until you think you have the time to spend an evening with me,_

_"and if we go some place to dance, I know that there's a chance you won't be leaving with me..." _

Hermione grinned. It was sweet and harmonious. Two voices lifted into the car with a song that Hermione was sure she hadn't heard her father listen to before. She kept on driving.

"_The time is right,_

_"your perfume fills my head, _

_"the stars get red, _

_"and oh, the night, so blue,_

_"and then I go and spoil it all by saying something stupid like 'I love you.'"_

Hermione's foot lifted off the gas when she realized she was singing along. She knew this song? The song continued in an orchestral interlude and Hermione was hit with a wave of Deja vu. She slammed on the brakes and welcomed that wave.

_A hand in hers. Dark. Fire in the fireplace. _

_A laugh. _

_Male. _

_Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. _

_Dark. _

The chorus interrupted Hermione. She stretched for the pictures that had materialized in her head. Her mind was slowly letting them go, her heart hammering. Hermione blinked hard, trying her hardest to get the pictures back. They left her, leaving a sense of warmth and familiarity in her. A hallow feeling lifted in her stomach. With a frustrated yell, Hermione struck the dash with the heel of her hand.

In a flurry, she made a u-turn and sped back home, playing the song over and over again for some help. There was nothing. She grabbed the CD, read the back.

_Frank Sinatra, Greatest Hits. _

_Track 1. Something Stupid (with Nancy Sinatra)._

Nothing was clicking. She hopped out of the SUV and ran inside, carrying the case with her. Her mum was sitting on the couch reading a book. She looked up when Hermione came running in. she gave her a curious, worried look. In desperation she handed the CD to her. Helen laughed aloud when she saw it.

"I forgot about this..."

"Mum, listen. Is there any possible way that dad listened to this with me around?" Hermione asked fretfully. Helen grinned and shook her head.

"No, no way. American Jazz is a closet passion for your father. No one was ever around when he listened to this. I don't know why, but he was ashamed of it. Why do you need to know?" Helen asked, turning over the CD case fondly. Hermione blinked rapidly.

"I don't know. Uh. No reason, just wondering," she said absentmindedly.

"You sure, hun? You look flustered," she said, sitting up and reaching for her. Hermione repelled, heading for her room.

"Side effect of the potions," she said, heading up to her room.

* * *

AN-I'm having a hard time conveying Hermione's emotion. Let me know what you think. 


End file.
